


Flying Model Rockets

by moneychangeseverything



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Cyclonus and Ratchet are here too, First Meetings, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Gift Fic, Lost Light Minibots Club, Pre-Slash, Whirl is doing his best, Whirl is not Rung's patient AU, making new friends
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:34:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28292454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moneychangeseverything/pseuds/moneychangeseverything
Summary: “It’s not fair that Magnus said someone has to go on with you,” Tailgate pouted. “You haven’t even been in the brig in like - a week!”“Yeah, s’gotta be a new record or something,” Whirl agreed. Still, good old Mags probably had a point - a lot could happen to a mech like Whirl on an alien planet. A lot had happened in the past - usually ending in explosions.
Relationships: Rung & Whirl, Rung/Whirl (Transformers)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 40





	Flying Model Rockets

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheOtherEyeIsNotResponsive](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOtherEyeIsNotResponsive/gifts).



> A holiday gift for AO3 user TheOtherEyeIsNotResponsive!! Hope you like c:

“Am I a fragging idiot, or what?” Whirl asked, laying back on Tailgate’s berth with a dramatic synthesized sigh. 

“You’re not an idiot!” Tailgate’s protest was slightly muffled by the weight of Whirl’s helm on his chest plating. 

“Indeed not,” Cyclonus agreed. 

“You know we’d happily go with you,” Tailgate continued, “it’s just that we only get one day of shoreleave and we’ve got tickets to this opera that I’ve been really wanting to go to that Cyclonus told be about before we even started dating and-” 

“Naw, mech,” Whirl said, cutting off his Amica’s babble. “You two can’t have me tagging along as a third wheel all the time. You go and enjoy your opera. I’ll just hang out here, try to stay out of trouble.” 

“You’re not just a third wheel!” Tailgate’s voice was getting teary - he was really heartbroken about this whole thing. It was cute. Nice to see the kid cry about something dumb like Whirl’s feelings, instead of the end-of-the-world scrap they’d dealt with for so long. 

Cyclonus spun to look at the two mechs on the berth, desk chair creaking. A short range comm buzzed through the air - unencrypted, of course - Cyc never wanted Whirl to feel like they were talking behind his back. That was cute, too. 

::Sweetspark, what have we said about crying when other people are sad?:: 

::That it takes attention away from where it belongs:: Tailgate replied, sniffing. 

::That’s right:: 

“Sorry, Whirl,” Tailgate said aloud. 

“It’s okay, Legs. I’ve made lotsa mechs cry in my time,” Whirl joked. He still wasn’t really used to the way that Cyc and TG just… cared about him. Like, went out of their way to think about how he might be feeling, and then - act on it? Life was weird, he didn’t know. 

“Yeah, by ripping their arms off!” Tailgate joked back. 

“Still counts!” Whirl protested. 

“Maybe Swerve would accompany you to the planet?” Cyclonus suggested. 

“It’s not fair that Magnus said someone has to go with you,” Tailgate pouted. “You haven’t even been in the brig in like - a week!” 

“Yeah, s’gotta be a new record or something,” Whirl agreed. Still, good old Mags probably had a point - a lot could happen to a mech like Whirl on an alien planet. A lot had happened in the past - usually ending in explosions. 

“But nah, Cyc,” he continued. “Swerve said he’s planning to stay here, run the bar for mechs who don’t get shore leave. He says he always makes the most shanix when people are drownin’ their sorrows.” 

Cyclonus clucked. Purple skeleton face talked a big game, but he was just as much of a weirdo as the rest of them - clicking and sighing and grunting instead of using his words. Whirl was used to it at this point, though. This particular sound meant that Cyc was disappointed by accepting. 

“What about Rewind and CD?” Tailgate offered. 

Whirl shuddered and made a face. Or - not really, but he did let his little optic-light blob out into a shape that said _no, thank you_. 

“Yeah, no,” he replied. “I’m not gonna tell you what they’re planning to do planet-side, but it’s nothing I want to get involved with.” 

Tailgate laughed - he and Rewind had probably already talked about it, in way too much detail. Whirl had a high tolerance for weird stuff, but even he thought the Lost Light Minibots Club was freaky. 

They settled into a comfortable silence together, helms empty. Well - Cyc and TG might be thinking about other mechs that could keep him company, but Whirl didn’t want to bother. He had precisely two friends, and they were both gonna be spending their shore leave at the opera instead of coming to the craft fair with him - so that was that. No point in trying to fight the inevitable. 

“Do you know a little orange mech called - Rong, or something along those lines?” Cyclonus asked, a few moments later. 

“Is he in MiniClub?” Tailgate asked. 

“I don’t believe so,” Cyclonus replied. 

“Is he friends with Ratch?” Whirl threw in. Little, orange - it was ringing some kind of bell, had him thinking about stuff he’d seen through a hazy optic, lying on a medberth. 

Cyclonus shrugged. He evidently didn’t know much about this guy - kinda interesting. Cyclonus wasn’t exactly friendly, but he did tend to keep tabs on everyone. Whirl was surprised that there was anyone on the ship the paranoid fragger didn’t know. 

“I’m pretty sure I’ve seen him in the medbay, a time or two,” Cyclonus agreed. 

“Yeah same. So - what about him?” 

“I think he might be interested in the craft fair,” Cyclonus shrugged, “I saw him building a model ship, once.” 

“Psht, like some random mini is gonna want to hang out all alone with big bad Whirl on a random planet during their shore leave,” Whirl deflected. 

“I would!” Tailgate piped up. 

“Yeah Teeg, but you’re not random,” Whirl scoffed. 

“It’s worth a shot, though!” Tailgate insisted. “You said that you really wanted to go, so. Why not?” His little servos stroked over Whirl’s optic housing, and the rotary sighed. 

“Fine, okay, I’ll give it a shot. How do I find this mech?” 

\--

“Ay, Ratch!” Whirl called exuberantly. 

“What are you doing here?” Ratchet snapped, not bothering to raise his helm from where it was buried in a datapad. “If you punched a wall again, I’m not fixing your claw.” 

“Naw, nothin’ like that,” Whirl replied. “I’m looking for a friend of yours.” 

“I don’t have friends,” Ratchet snorted. 

“What about Drift?” 

This got Ratchet to look up, rolling his eyes hard enough to pop ‘em out of their sockets. 

“Just tell me who you’re looking for, Whirl - I don’t have time for your shenanigans right now.” 

“Little orange mech, makes model ships, called something like Rong?” 

“What in the name of Primus do you want with Rung?” Ratchet asked, genuine confusion in his voice. 

“Maybe I wanna ask him out - what’s it to you?” Whirl replied, starting to get annoyed. He came in here to ask a quick question, and got nothing but backtalk. Typical.

Ratchet glared up at Whirl for a moment, then shrugged. 

“Whatever. Maybe spending some time with Rung would be good for you. I’ll ping you the location of his office.” 

The notification popped up on his HUD, and Whirl walked out of Ratchet’s office without another word. It wasn’t that he and the doc didn’t get along, really. It was just that they were both annoying fraggers, and neither was willing to compromise on that enough to have any semblance of a decent relationship. 

Whatever. Whirl didn’t need anyone but his two Amicas, someone behind the bar to serve him a drink, and maybe a couple hours of this little orange rando’s time. 

His office was kinda close to the medbay, at least. Maybe that’s why he was friends with Ratchet? Proximity? It seemed like a good sign - if this guy could stand to deal with the Hatchet for more than a couple kliks, he couldn’t be too scared of Whri. Hopefully. 

Like sure, it was dumb, but. Whirl wanted to go to the fragging craft fair, okay? The organics on-planet were renowned across the sector for having high-quality merchandise and tools. Plus, those little tiny fingers could make really delicate stuff. Whirl wasn’t saying that he was thinking about getting back into making chronos - Tailgate’s urging aside, he wasn’t ready for that - but there was no harm in looking, was there? When was he gonna get a chance like this again? 

Whirl stopped in front of the normal, plain-looking door, feeling an inexplicable shiver through his struts. Stupid to be nervous. He smacked his claws together, hard, then reached out to knock on the door. 

It whooshed open under his servo. Whirl stumbled back, worried he’d tripped some kind of sensor, and saw a - yep, just as described - little orange mech looking up at him through thick auxiliary lenses. 

“Hello,” Rung said, surprisingly mild. He looked unconcerned by Whirl’s flailing. So his frame had a weird center of balance, so what? 

“Uh, yeah. Hi,” Whirl answered, finding his feet. 

A beat passed. 

“Is there something I can help you with?” the orange bot asked. 

“Oh - yeah! Yeah, there is. I wanted to um, ask you something?” If Whirl had a mouth, he’d be biting his glossa right now.

“Ah. Well, perhaps you’d like to step into my office?” Rung stepped back, gesturing elegantly. 

“Sure, okay. Sure thing!” 

Whirl didn’t know why he was so flustered. Sure, the whole situation was a bit weird, but he’d definitely seen weirder. No one was even bleeding! Primus, he needed to get it together. After a moment, he managed to corral his limbs into a comfortable chair, and took a deep vent - like Tailgate was always telling him - to clear his processor. 

The mech sat down in another of the fancy chairs, crossing his legs and looking at Whirl expectantly. 

“Aw, sorry mech, I want to ask you a favour, but I’m not sure where to start,” the rotary admitted. 

“Well, I’d like to know your name,” Rung suggested. Whirl felt like an even bigger idiot. 

“Yeah, ‘course, shoulda led with that. It’s Whirl. And you’re Rung, right?” 

The orange mech twitched, light flashing off his glasses. 

“What? Sorry, is that wrong?” Whirl asked. Primus, like things could get any worse - he was offending this bot more with every word out of his mouth. 

“No, no,” possibly-not-Rung said. 

Whirl waved one of his claws in a ‘go on’ gesture. 

The little mech gave himself a slight shake, then smiled up at Whirl. 

“It’s just that most people don’t get my name right, that’s all,” he said. 

“Oh,” Whirl said. 

They looked at each other for another awkward beat. 

“So - “ 

“So about that favour!”

“Ah, yes. What about it?” Rung asked. 

“I um. Well. I was gonna go for some shoreleave? On the planet?,” Whirl began. He couldn’t just come out and say that he wanted this mech to go with him, right? That would be too much. 

“Indeed. I had similar plans...” Rung said after a klik, trailing off hesitantly. 

“You did? You do? Great! So like, do you wanna go with me?” 

Rung was visibly taken aback. Like, the mech’s whole frame rocked back in his chair - that’s how surprised he was. No one was screaming yet, though. Could have been worse. 

“You mean, go for shore leave - together?” he asked. 

“Yeah? Didn’t I just say that?” Whirl untangled his legs, setting his pedes on the floor so he could get up quickly when the inevitable ‘no’ came out. 

“Alright,” Rung said. 

“Cool okay fine no worries mech, it happens y’know, whatever, I’ll just get outta your seams then - wait. What?” Whirl rebooted his optic. Yeah, he knew it wasn’t connected to his audial sensors, but still. What? 

“Yes, I’ll go planetside with you, Whirl,” Rung said. It was hard to tell with the glasses, but the copter thought his eyes might have been smiling. 

“But I didn’t even tell you about the craft fair!” Whirl objected. 

“A craft fair? That sounds lovely. I hope they offer model-building supplies,” Rung said. Like it was a done deal or something. Like he was just gonna hang out with Whirl no matter what they did - like the craft fair was just the cherry on top of the energon smoothie. Wild. 

“I uh. Yeah, they probably do. The organics here are pretty well-known for making good tools?” 

“Excellent!” Rung clapped his hands together. “I do so appreciate how finely detailed organic craftsmanship is. I’ve been jealous of those tiny digits a time or two.” 

“Yeah! That’s exactly what I said,” Whirl grinned. Or not really, but. Y’know. Then he winced, because if he’d ever set himself up for a claw joke, this was it. 

But Rung just smiled, and said, “I’ll meet you in the shuttle bay, at the start of second shift tomorrow.” 

“Seeya then, Rung!” Whirl trilled. Oh baby, he was riding high. He was gonna see some tiny things, hang out with a tiny mech, buy some tools! He almost danced down the corridor back to Cyclonus and Tailgate’s habsuite. 

\-- 

In the morning he was - well. Not riding high, that was for sure. 

“Whirl baby, c’mon, you’re going to be late,” Tailgate sighed. He’d been saying that for more or less the last half a shift. Good thing Cyc was on duty - he’d have probably just picked the rotary up and hauled him to the shuttle bay whether he liked it or not. 

“Nah, don’t have time to polish. Rung should just go without me,” Whirl had been making up random excuses for the last half a shift, too. 

It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go - he did! He really wanted to go, and have a great time, and see those sweet little orange hands and those thick blue glasses and bask in the warmth of Rung’s presence. But the fact of the matter was that Whirl ruined stuff. That was what he did, okay - wrecking had been his job for a long time. And he didn’t want to do that today - but Whirl didn’t always get what he wanted. Maybe it was better to keep the potential of a great day, instead of the almost-certain-to-be-a-disaster reality. 

“You don’t need to polish, Whirl! You look great!” Tailgate protested. 

“I agree,” came a soft voice from the direction of the door. 

“Rung? What are you doing here?” Whirl was shocked into speech - given a moment to think about it, he might have just pulled the berth cover up over his head and pretended to be asleep. 

“Cyclonus gave me a call and mentioned that you might want some company on the way to the shuttlebay,” Rung said. 

He managed to make the bizarre request sound totally normal - how? Whirl didn’t know. He’d never met anyone as put-together, as unflappable as Rung seemed to be. Not like a mech pretending he’d seen it all (the way Ratchet did) but like someone who was steady enough to take life as it came. He’d really only seen the mech off-balance when - well, when Whirl turned the focus onto Rung himself, saying his name or asking for his company. An interesting combination - it made Whirl want to know more. 

“You’re Rung!” Tailgate sprang off the berth, where he’d been sitting next to Whirl and poking his optic. “I’m Tailgate!” 

“Nice to meet you, Tailgate,” Rung smiled. 

“You’re going to take good care of Whirl today, right?” Tailgate said, leaning into the orange mech’s space. It was probably supposed to be menacing, but it mostly came off like the waste disposal bot wanted a hug. 

“I’ll certainly try,” Rung said, leaning back slightly. 

“Good!” Tailgate nodded firmly, already moving back, digging into his subspace. He came out with a magnet. Oh Primus, please not the magnet, Whirl thought. 

“Hey Rung?” Tailgate asked, “Would you describe yourself as a minibot?” 

“Okay!” Whirl said, springing up from the berth and hustling to the door. “Time to go, gonna be late, shuttle’s gonna leave whether we’re on it or not.” 

“Wait! Whirl!” Tailgate called as the rotary herded Rung down the hallway. “I need to ask him if he wants to join MiniClub!” 

Whirl kept the two of them moving, and they were quickly out of audio-range. 

“Trust me,” Whirl said, looking at the confused expression on Rung’s face. “You do not want to join MiniClub.” 

“Ah, alright then,” Rung said, sounding more curious than accepting. 

“Seriously. It’s better not to ask what goes on there. I went once, and let’s just say, ignorance is bliss.” 

Rung looked up at Whirl’s face - or not face, but y’know - and burst out laughing. He had a nice laugh, rich and bubbling. It was almost nice enough to be worth the intense embarrassment stabbing Whirl in the spark. 

“Sorry, sorry,” Rung gasped, catching his vents. “It’s just that - your EM field was so _offended_! And I know that you were a Wrecker during the war, so I was just surprised that you could be shocked by something so innocent.” 

“Oh EM fields, yeah. I remember those,” Whirl said - he didn’t exactly feel better but. He didn’t feel worse either. And it was pretty funny, if you thought about it like that. Buncha cute little mechs sharing way too much personal information wasn’t much compared to, say, Garrus-9.

He’d still probably take a good old fashioned shoot out over another MiniClub session, though. Rewind was scary when he got going. 

Whirl shrugged, looking down at Rung to say as much, and was met with big, earnest, slightly tired looking optics. 

“I’m sorry, Whirl,” the orange mech said, aching sincerity in his voice. He was polishing his lenses with some kind of mesh fabric he must have stored in subspace or something. Whirl hadn’t been sure that the glasses came off - lots of mechs had mods like that installed permanently, after all. But apparently they did, and there was something soft, almost vulnerable about those naked optics - Whirl couldn’t look away. 

“It’s no big thing, Orange.” 

The corners of Rung’s optics crinkled up, and Whirl felt his optic curve to match.

“Now I’m the one who should say sorry,” the rotary laughed. “That was awful - Orange is not a good nickname. But we gotta come up with something! I can’t be calling your whole designation all the time - way too formal for a couple of craft fair pals.” 

“My designation is shorter than yours, Whirl,” Rung protested as they climbed into the transport. His glasses were back on, too - crazy how quick things could go back to normal. 

“Sure it’s short, but short doesn’t mean casual!” 

Whirl spent the majority of the shuttle ride down to the planet’s surface trying to explain the importance of a good nickname to Rung. Sure, the other passengers stared at Whirl like he was a horde of scraplets dancing ballet, but that didn’t matter. Rung was looking at him with those lovely, shining optics tucked safe behind his glasses - no other glance could touch him.

**Author's Note:**

> They were supposed to actually go to the craft fair, but instead all of this happened! 
> 
> You can also find me @moneychanges_ev on twitter.   
> All feedback is loved ❤


End file.
